Diver ends Loch Ness walk

A man clad in an old-fashioned, lead-booted diving suit clambered out of Scotland's famed Loch Ness for the final time yesterday at the end of an epic underwater trek to raise money for a leukaemia charity.

Lloyd Scott, who took five days to complete the London marathon above ground in the same diving suit last year and has worn the outfit in marathons in New York and Edinburgh, took 12 days to complete his 42-kilometre sub-aquatic ramble along a stretch of the loch.

"Some people said it would be easier because the water would support the weight of the suit but in actual fact it is far harder," he said.

"I have had to battle against pressure, the resistance of the water and poor visibility. It is very cold, it is very lonely, I don't know what is underfoot and my airline gets tangled. There are all number of problems that actually make it far more difficult than doing it on land," he added.

Scott, 41, a former fireman and footballer who has already raised millions of pounds for charity, had only one serious scare during his lonely trip along a ledge 10 metres below the surface of the immensely deep loch.

"I was crawling in some silt with nil visibility and just sort of tumbled off the ledge," he said.

"I was caught by my safety line and my airline, totally disorientated."

Undeterred, the former leukaemia sufferer carried on and finally ended his trek yesterday morning.

So had he caught sight of the loch's famously elusive resident, the Loch Ness Monster?

"I have only seen two fish up to now, which either means there are not many fish in the loch - or something has eaten them all," he said.